The Wicked Wallflower (Wallflower, 1) Mass Market Paperback – October 29, 2013

The Wicked Wallflower is the first in an intriguing-sounding new series that mixes historical and contemporary romance. It will consists of three historical romance novels that are "written" by the protagonist of a set of contemporary novellas. The "author" bases her novels on her own love life and the short stories show where the inspiration came from.I have been reading Maya Rodale ever since her debut novel, The Heir and the Spare, and have enjoyed all of them. So I was definitely excited to try her new series especially when I learned about the different approach she is taking with these books.What I Liked---I love a good wallflower/rake romance which is one of the reasons I was drawn to this book. The meeting of opposites (in society's mind) is always intriguing. Emma and Blake are an example of a couple that shouldn't work, but they ended up being perfect for one another.---The hero, Blake, stole the book for me! I love it when rakes get their comeuppance and he took his feelings for Emma in stride. I thought his obsession with his Difference Engine and his past made him more than just a pretty face. Plus it was awesome that he was the first one to reveal his feelings!---Female friendships are another thing that I love to see in books and the one between Emma, Olivia, and Prudence was well-written. The scene where the girls drink too much sherry and write the infamous letter sounds like hang-out sessions that I did with my best friends. I'm interested to see how their friendship develops as more of them get married.---The Fortune Games was such an entertaining concept! I am a reality show fan so I appreciated the finer details that Rodale threw in there like the bizarre points tallying to the abrupt evictions. It was just a nice way to force Emma and Blake to spend time with each other after announcing their "engagement" away from the distractions of London.---Aunt Agatha was my second favorite character because she is what I want to be when I get to be her age: confident in my self and not afraid to say what I want when I want to. Her relationship with Blake was especially touching.What I Didn't Like---I am just not a fan of love triangles in any genre. Even though with this being a historical romance, the reader knows who will get the girl in the end and I just found myself being annoyed with that whole plot point. I wish more time had been spent on the obvious couple getting to know more about one another than dealing with the "who will she choose" question.---In connection with the above point, I really started to get annoyed with Emma towards the end. I know she had convinced herself that she was in love with Benedict, but I wanted to smack her in the head when she kept going back and forth between the two men. I wanted her to just make a decision and stick with it. I actually started feeling bad for Benedict because of the way she was stringing him along.My ConclusionI thought this was an adorable love story between two likable people. It is light-hearted (for the most part) and I appreciate the skill involved in writing something like that. Definitely got what I expected with this one and am looking forward to reading more of the series.

As others have already done so I will not write a description but rather go into how much and why I loved this book.Miss Rodale did a wonderful job developing both characters and their romance. I found Emma to be an endearing, relatable and sweet character. I like the fact that her doubts and insecurities didn't just disappear all of the sudden which is a fault that most authors make when pairing the handsome rogue with the plain wallflower. I applaud Miss Rodale for making us the readers take that journey along with Emma from being the Plain Wallflower to her Happily ever after while dealing with her insecurities and doubts in a way that was believable, but most of all relatable.As someone else mention, there were a couple of inaccuracies that bother me but not enough to get in the way of my enjoyment. First off no engage couple in Regency England would be allowed to go of a trip by themselves with no chaperone, while reading that part the first thing that came to my mind was were is her chaperone. I guess that allowances could be made for the fact that they were going to the Fortune Games and thus were standing to gain 90K pounds but still it was a little grating. Also Emma didn't seem to go anywhere with a chaperone I am guessing that if she was totally and utterly compromised she would have to get married but still appearances should have been kept.I love Lady Agatha and her Fortune Games and the obvious similarities to the Hunger Games, those scenes were some of the most fun.All in all Blake and Emma are most of all relatable and endearing and I love reading them and I can't wait to read the rest of the series with Lady Olivia and Miss Prudence. And on a side note a truly hope Miss Dawkins gets if not her own book at least a novella.This was a great start to Wallflower series and I am looking forward to the contemporary retelling of this story in the Bad Boy Billionaire Wicked Arrangement.

I love historical romance and this was not a bad example. There were some plausibility issues and I wasn't keen on the "Fortune Games" as this seemed to be a kind of caricature of "Hunger Games" - the Games were not even that interesting and I didn't like being reminded of more modern themes. However, I loved Emma's character and the whole idea behind the story. I enjoyed the book as a whole and there were some very witty and amusing scenes. I would recommend it.

£90000 £30000 such unbelievable sums of money in this century.....I wish the authors would put more research into their books

Fun read. I liked it

Sometimes that story takes a long time getting to the main points, however it ends well and I did enjoyed reading it.

I really enjoyed this story - the main characters were great, the story was well written and it was also very amusing. Excellent!